CHICAGO: Days 3 and 4: Law School and Beyond

Life is full swing back in the Fort, as it always is, particularly when you get home from a vacation at 9 p.m. on a Sunday night in the insanity that is the month of May for families with school-age children. But before we get back to reality, let's linger in Chicago just a little while longer. I can't believe a week ago today we'd spent our first evening there. It really was such a wonderful few days. Too wonderful really. I can't stop looking at condos and texting links of them to James.

When we left off it was Friday night and I was going to bed with a smile on my face and lots of amazing food (topped off by just a little more Garrett's popcorn) in my belly. Saturday was to be UChicago day - the reunion, the whole reason we booked this trip and had the kids miss school and James leave the swim school right at his most busiest month.

We were supposed to start with brunch at another favorite spot but I woke up unable to even contemplate more food, so we made do with tea (me) and cinnamon bread and cereal bars (everyone else) thanks to the nearby Trader Joe's. Honestly I think the kids were relieved. We usually only eat out 3-4 times a month and even on vacation I generally do a lot of cooking, so we were all drowning a bit in the deliciousness.

We decided to head to campus early and grab our first meal there. Back when we lived in Chicago I drove to school every day. The University Chicago is in/near South Side and the closest L station was 3 blocks south of campus which was a decidedly not great area. With the Obama Presidential Library and Community Center being built, a plan by the city to update that South Side L stop, and the general southward spread of campus and its students and professors, the internet told me the Green Line Cottage Grove stop was perfectly fine to take. And since we had our L pass and I adore public transportation, off we went! To the end of the line!

We got off and walked our 4 blocks up to campus. First stop was the bookstore where I bought a t-shirt I'll probably never wear because I never wear t-shirts but there's just something about being in a bookstore that makes you think you need one. I also got a Christmas tree ornament because I realized last year I didn't have one related to my time at UC.

The kids immediately noticed the beautiful Gothic architecture and ivy covering the buildings. "It's like a bunch of castles!" Claire told me. The flowers, as always, were gorgeous. I loved this campus. Rockefeller did a good job with it.

It was 10:45 and we were finally hungry for solid food again so we headed over to my favorite dining hall. Bartlett is housed in the old gymnasium and the track still exists around the edges of the ceiling. The kids were DELIGHTED by college dining. All you can eat? And you get to hold a PLASTIC TRAY?! What could be better?

Frankly, not much. Especially when it costs $40 to feed your family of five and you have the whole buffet to yourselves because none of the undergrads are awake yet.

Post lunch we moseyed over across the Midway (site of the 1893 World's Fair!) to the law school. It's not the prettiest building on campus, but it's not the ugliest either. Other than the fact it doesn't match the rest of campus, I actually quite like it.

And here I finally got to see some old friends. Reunion banners hung from the ceiling, kids ran about, and a face painter was in residence! Like Take Your Kids To Work Day before it, Reunion Day did not give an accurate look at the law school. The kids think it all looks super fun and wouldn't be able to imagine I spent weeks during 1L year very seriously imagining driving my car into the lake. I mean, I was going to jump out like an action star before it hit the water, I just thought I might get to delay my finals a day or two due to the drama of it all. (But who am I kidding? This is Chicago, I totally would have had to take them on time.) Cheerful thoughts!

Even James got in on the face-painting fun for a bit of advertising. Sort of like what was now stretched across Landon's face. Nothing says entrepreneur like getting free advertising space on your son's forehead.

I wandered around the school a bit, pausing in this hallway (our main one; it's a small school, all four of our big classrooms were here and all my 1L classes were held right here. All my finals were here. All my pre-pregnancy research and obsessive fertility charting was done in those rooms when I should have been listening to corporations and Landon walked with much assistance down this hall my 3L year). So many memories! It didn't seem nearly so intimidating on Saturday. It even made me smile. I have a lot of feelings about this place. It systematically broke down my brain, made me cry, and then built me a better one. I had the most amazing professors and most supportive classmates. I'm proud to have gone. I'm glad to be done.

The kids loved the library and couldn't believe how much I'd sat at those tables to study. (And blog. And read other blogs. But let's pretend it was all studying.)

The water feature required a lot of playing and we got a nice family picture in front of it. James and I had been married for our two weeks when I first showed up at this school. Thirteen years later, perhaps the biggest surprise is that we now live in Fort Worth, Texas. I did not see that coming.

We took the L back around 3, Cora declining to walk really any part of the way. She spent most of Chicago getting piggy back rides from her siblings, with the occasional assist for James or me. Third babies, they know how to work the system. They are also very comfortable sleeping wherever required. Cora took cat naps on the red, orange, and green lines on our trip.

We got back to the condo around 3 and Cora requested a nap, James got to work, Claire chilled with her kindle, and I bribed Landon with the promise of his own bag of whatever popcorn he wanted if he'd walk the 1.6 miles round-trip to our nearest Garrett's so I could get more Chicago Mix. We sported our new UChicago gear and it was super fun to walk through the city with my Chicago baby.

After we all recharged in our own ways (MOAR POPCORN), we headed back out to the city to do some walking and find dinner. We ended up at The Marq which was delicious and not too far away. Though really, anything was too far for Cora.

Poor Cora. Is it really too much to ask to be carried everywhere in a gold-plated and plush sedan chair?

After dinner we made our way over to Millennium Park again. The night was spectacular. Perfect weather, perfect skies... we just wandered slowly about, soaking it all in. People were everywhere and the city was at its Spring best. After a while we headed south, determined to have the kids in bed by 9 (they usually go to bed at 8; life is just better when they get their sleep). Cora was carried by all members of the family and we all paid lip service to the idea that tomorrow we'd make her walk. (No, no we didn't.)

We put Landon to sleep in our room (he had been sleeping on the pull-out couch) so James and I could actually spend some time awake in the main area of the condo after-hours. We hung out, sat on the balcony together, did some work (my version of work being the uploading of our pictures)... it was a very nice last evening. We went to bed about 11 and transferred Landon to his couch bed. He walked himself (I sort of forgot he weighs 88 lbs. when I came up with the "we'll just switch him" plan), but woke up the next morning expressing GREAT shock at having changed beds.

On Sunday we made good on our tasty brunch from the day before and I was ready. Bongo Room was a beloved favorite when we lived in Chicago and we were delighted to find it was still there, right where we left it! And our new condo was only 3 blocks away! The white chocolate and caramel pretzel pancakes were still on the menu and they were still delicious.

I was determined to make it to North Michigan Avenue, so we took the L up to the Chicago stop and walked around from there. We stopped at Water Tower Place, the old water station, and the usual NoMi haunts. Cora was delighted by "her new castle!" and insisted of a picture of her upon it.

We walked to the Oak Street Beach and I fell in love with the city all over again. Building a sand castle in the shadows of the John Hancock Building. I love this place.

It was a perfect chilly morning - back in the 60's - so luckily I didn't have to convince anyone to stay out of the water.

I love a city on a lake.

We stopped at the North Michigan Ave. Lululemon (my kind of sightseeing), waved to the hospital where Landon was born (Northwestern!), and then took the L back. I think I'd pushed the kids about as far as I could on the whole walking thing. Just to check I asked if anyone wanted to walk back with me (about 2.5 miles) and they all looked to James like, for real? Can we be honest? Will this hurt her feelings? DO SOMETHING AND STOP THIS. So the L it was.

We stopped at Stan's Donuts in the floor of our Roosevelt L stop because we'd passed by it 6 times and I'd never let anyone get anything and it's named for my dad, so we felt duty bound to support his franchise. They were incredibly delicious and I was glad I hadn't known that the other 3 days.

We walked over the Roosevelt Bridge a second-to-last time and then James took the kids to swim in the condo pool while I packed up and did laundry.

(Our building! The one that's not the Sear's Tower!)

All packed up, we headed back to the L one more time, now with our suitcases back in tow. Cora had insisted on changing back into her Wonder Woman dress for our second round of air travel. "Wonder Woman FLIES mom," she told me very seriously.

She slept the whole way to the airport on the Orange Line. She really loves a good nap and her life so far has taught her to catch them wherever she can. Especially if a Mama is holding you.

The flight home was good - we all ate some of the granola bars I'd packed in Texas, but no one wanted lunch or dinner. When I added up our charges on the trip I found we'd spent $300 less on activities than I expected because the weather was so beautiful we stayed outside and didn't do any of the museums I thought we would, but we spent $300 MORE on food. That sounds about right and I have no regrets.

We got to the house about 9 p.m. Everyone had some cereal, we put everything away, and the kids went to bed. It was a magnificent trip. I had waited years and years to take the kids to my favorite city, talking myself into and out of trips on a yearly basis. Just wait until 10 years, I'd tell myself. Everyone will be a good age to go and it will be worth the wait.

And it was.

And seeing the city through the kids' eyes was so fun. Maggie Daley Park was by FAR their favorite thing. We spent hours and hours there on Thursday and Friday. They loved the Sky Deck and the River Cruise. They loved riding the L. They loved that we let them have things like "Oreo S'mores Pancakes" and called it breakfast. They loved campus and it was so very special to me to bring them there. Far more so than I expected. The know UT of course. We lived in Austin and have been back a time or two to visit. But The University of Chicago feels collegiate in a very different way and they never had a mental picture for mom's other degree and that time in their parents' lives.

When we were in the elevator going up to our condo after the reunion, Landon was wearing his new University of Chicago Law School shirt (which he also wore the next day after asking me to wash it) and an older man in the elevator looked at him and said, "wow, UChicago Law, that's very impressive" while gazing over at James. "My MOM went there, Landon exclaimed, "and I went there when I was a BABY."

"Wow, Good job mom!" the man replied heartily. And Landon nodded knowingly like, yeah! I know, right?! I had no idea.

It's silly, but it was a moment for me. Landon isn't quite old enough to not think we're smart, but I'm not sure he'd ever particularly thought of us as affirmatively so either. We're just the parents. We handle things and that's what we're supposed to do. But on Saturday, he very clearly, very suddenly and surprisingly, in that morning found me to be impressive, on my own, for something I'd done. So it was a moment.

He's my law school baby. Here we are in 2008 and 2018.

In 2028 he's promised to be the one to pick up me.

California Beautiful

In what already feels like a dream, I spent this past Friday through Sunday in stunningly beautiful Montecito, California with some of my best friends from law school celebrating our beautiful, beloved, and soon-to-be-bride Alli. Even when I was there, everything about California was so impossibly perfect it felt fake (except the traffic, though even that was so super sized it almost seemed fake as well), but after a day of storms and grey in Fort Worth, it seems particularly impossible that I was doing handstands on the beach at Santa Barbara just yesterday morning.

The trip was amazing. I just typed and deleted a recounting of our itinerary, because that isn't really the point. The point is that this place is magical. You don't need air conditioning and you can keep all the windows open because there aren't any mosquitoes. No mosquitoes. I'd move there for that alone.

Alli generously rented us a beautiful estate in the hills for all to gather. The door was unlocked for us on arrival because, again, this is a magical place. 1.5 acres, a hot tub, big bedrooms, a bigger kitchen, and hills and rocks and flowers everywhere you looked. The room my friend Katie and I shared had a full set of the Babysitter's Club books. What could be better?

I spent a long time traveling to get there, but Alli flew in from Hong Kong, and other friends from the East Coast, so I couldn't complain. And I got to make a stop at Katie's West Hollywood apartment, which was lovely after she has so generously visited me at both of my Texas abodes. We bought a lot of wine at Trader Joe's before picking up a few more ladies and driving up the PCH to Santa Barbara. My first sighting of the ocean made me squeal. It'd been a long time since we'd seen each other.

We talked and laughed and ate candy on the trip. We exclaimed over the house and headed out for dinner in town. We stayed up late drinking wine in the hot tub and marveling at how many more stars are in the Montecito hills than our respective homes of LA, NYC, DFW, DC, and HK.

I woke up too early and couldn't figure out why everywhere was so content to lounge and then I remembered that I was in an earlier time zone and wasn't traveling with small children. I made tea and waited for everyone else to catch up. We went to a Farmer's Market so bright and beautiful it nearly made me cry. We don't have one in Fort Worth and I can only imagine the vegetable chopping I could do if we did.

Everyone bought what looked good to them and we cooked it all up for dinner that night. I bought the most amazing carrots I've ever tasted (I know, that is a ridiculous sentence, but you haven't had them) and a carton of pluots, a gorgeous dark purple and vibrant pink fruit that made me think of Claire. With our produce safely in our car (where we could leave it because it's not 100 degrees outside; madness!), we headed off to a yoga studio in Goleta for a private aerial yoga class.

It was amazing and my new goal in life is to own an aerial yoga studio in Fort Worth.

Or just wait for someone else to open one so I can go all the time.

Our teacher opened our class with, "did you do a lot of drinking last night?"

I really enjoy being upside down. It's so nice when your face can match your pants.

We ended in our cocoons, which is basically a swingier form of savasana that was like being back in the womb. But roomier and less sticky.

We got back to the house and lazed about, reading, drinking (it was 5:00 on the east coast), or, if you're me, making your friend in sandals explore the property with you. We had over an acre at our disposal! I needed to see it all- secret fountains, little tables and chairs tucked away at different elevations. I soaked it up, chased a lizard, and strangely took no pictures.

Here, have a roasted candy cane beet instead

Later, everyone cooked their market items and we ended up with an amazing and shockingly healthy dinner- roasted veggies, my first ever pleasant taste of beets (they don't have to be slimy and purple and gross; they can be golden or pink and white striped and all crazy delicious!), fresh breads, steamed artichokes, two roasted chickens, salad, and so much fruit. All local and organic and so inexpensive it would make you cry as you walk through your mid-city Whole Foods.

Before I left for the trip, Katie had mentioned going for a run on Sunday and I, wrapped up in my love for Katie and excitement for the trip, said, "Oh, I'll go too!". But I don't run. I hate running and I am terrible at it. The furthest I've ever gone was 3.0 miles in 2002, just to prove I could, and then I retired from running immediately afterward. I do not run.

Sunday morning found me running, in my 3-year-old running shoes that totally messed up my instep, chatting with my runner friends and marveling at how much running didn't suck when you can do it while looking at this:

And talking to them:

Also, I've just never been this lean or in this good of shape. That sounds like puffery, but I was shocked at how much easier running felt now versus when I'd done it 13 years and 15 pounds ago. I might not hate running after all. Or beets. I feel like I have to reconsider everything now.

Also cacti make up my new favorite flower

We went 3.1 miles, besting my personal record for distance, and Alli and I celebrated with cartwheels on the beach.

Santa Barbara is almost stupidly beautiful.

After showering and packing and gorging on more fruit (we had 8 girls in the house and probably 16 lbs. of 10 different varieties of fruit; magic!) we headed out for lunch and shopping. I felt my run deserved a reward and my reward took the form of a Mexican combo platter that included a whole steak buried under many other things.

I ate it all. We walked and shopped our way through downtown Santa Barbara while I tried to stop myself from saying, "it's just so pretty" for the 600th time and then it was time for hugs and farewells so I could catch my 2.5 hour bus ride to make my 3.0 hour plane ride before my 1.0 hour car ride home. I pulled in the driveway at 1:15 a.m., was in bed with a snuggly JP at 1:18 a.m. and blissfully asleep minutes later. I woke up feeling refreshed and loved with JP wrapped around me and the big kids banging on our door. Cora screamed when she saw me and clawed her way up my side like a monkey. The best part of leaving is always the coming back.

I packed my pluots for the bus ride.
California makes me a better person.

But man, the time when you're gone can be pretty incredible too. I love those ladies and I LOVE California. I sometimes wonder what my life would have been like if I'd headed to a different law school back in 2005- what if I'd gone to Columbia as I'd originally committed? or waited out the wait list at Stanford? How different would my life have been if I'd moved to New York or California? But I always come back to the fact that UChicago, besides giving me an incredible legal education (though admittedly, by nearly killing me in the process), put all these strong and brilliant women in my life, plus even more who couldn't make it, and just for that, I wouldn't change a thing.

Though I wouldn't mind if I could now find us a reason to move to California.

Turning Tables

Not just my favorite Adele song, but a good summary of my Chicago OCI experience.

I may be unusual, but I really enjoyed being the interviewee when I was going through OCI and call-backs. In part, I'm sure, because I was interviewing in the pre-recession days when law firms were flush with cash and clients and in full wooing mode for candidates from top law schools. Summer programs were huge (my office had 26 summer associates when I was there in 2007; this summer we had 9) and budgets were non-existent. It never occurred to anyone in my class that we would leave law school without full-time market paying employment at a top 100 law firm if we wanted it. Times have changed and the balance of power has tipped, but I still think it was fun to speed date with various law firms over resumes and cocktails.

It's different being the interviewer. For one, you're now the wooer rather than the wooee. You're the old wife, and the firm is looking for the new hot girlfriend (or boyfriend). You have a job, so there's no pressure on you for the interview, but you have a job, so there's a lot of pressure coming from your blackberry that you can't check because you're in the interview. You're selling the firm, and you're judging your candidate, and you're trying not to crush the bright eyed enthusiasm coming from their side of the table.

I was probably not in the best frame of mind to be doing screening interviews for 22 optimistic candidates. I had finished working the night before at 4 a.m. and logged 2.25 hours of sleep before dragging myself out of bed to head to the law school. My case had exploded, I had a million and six things to do and emails to answer, and I'm staring with skeptical bloodshot eyes at someone saying "I can't wait to be a lawyer." But in spite of all that, I enjoyed myself. I like talking to people and we had some really fabulous candidates. Someone asked on the last post if I had any advice for 2Ls going through OCI right now and while it's not exactly advice, I do have a few observations, some of which surprised me (I've done a lot of call-back interviews at our office for the people who made it through the screening interviews at OCI; this was my first experience with the big pool of candidates, and at Chicago, employers have no say over who gets their interview slots, so it's more "pre-screened" than usual):

- With all but 3-4 candidates, I had my check-mark or x-mark made within 5 minutes. That surprised me the most, that you could make the decision so fast and the next 15 minutes only verified what you'd already decided. Twenty minutes was usually too much rather than too little time to spend with a candidate. This instant yes/no decision was based almost entirely on the person's ability to converse, to make eye contact, and to know a bare minimum of information about the firm (a very bare minimum).

- Candidates who had worked before law school were almost universally better interviewers. The difference in poise, confidence, and ability to answer questions about themselves and their intended career path was enormous.

- It is very annoying to hear a candidate refer to their 1L summer firm as "we". Once or twice is fine, as it can make sense to use that pronoun in some answers about your previous summer employment, but to universally refer to everything about that firm in terms of "we" in an interview with a known competitor firm is odd.

- Don't have a spiel. It's transparent and impossible to pull off smoothly. We have your resume and transcript and we'll send both to the hiring committee along with our recommendations for fly-backs, but the reason the firm pays to send three attorneys to Chicago for 2 days is to talk to you-- to have a conversation and to see if you're someone we'd like to work with. Don't launch in to a speech that doesn't allow for interruption or back-and-forth conversation, it defeats the purpose of us being in the room with you.

- If you have a minute before the interview, and if you have a laptop or the firm posts the interviewers bios outside the room, glance through them quickly to learn the basic info about your interviewers. Even just office location of each person-- it's not necessary, but it helps and is a way to show you prepared that easily works itself into your conversation. Knowing practice area is a bonus, but you definitely don't need to know more than that.

- Have a reason why you want to be a lawyer. It doesn't have to be a great one- I'm still not sure I have a great one, but just be able to talk thoughtfully about your path to law school and why you think it's right for you. That question was usually my favorite part of the interview, the answers varied so much and were usually charmingly idealistic.

- Know the firm's general clientele- plaintiffs v. defendants, government v. private, etc. Non-profit work is a wonderful thing, but you're not likely to find the same clients at a Vault 50 firm. If anything, we probably represent the companies you were adverse to and are now maligning in your interview.

Overall I have to say that most people were great. The ones who weren't, weren't, and it wasn't because of nerves or anything superficial like that. Even with no sleep and the constant emails I had to send during breaks, it was a fun day. I even met two blog readers who made me feel like a minor celebrity. I look forward to going again next year, and just hope the judge on whatever case I'm on at the time doesn't hand down a huge, case-altering ruling just as I'm about to board the plane to my city up North.

My Chicagos

I woke up in Chicago today- woke up in a Four Season's hotel room, with a full view of the lake, with the bright sun bouncing off the water and straight into my eyes. I sprang out of bed and slammed the black out drapes closed, but there was at least 2 seconds before I realized how early it was and how little sleep I'd gotten and how scratchy my eyes and throat felt, that I just felt happy. And now after two extra post-sunrise hours of sleep, I'm back to pure happiness. I really truly love this beautiful city.

I flew up yesterday morning to attend a 1L recruiting event at the law school. I went to this event last year at 6 months pregnant, and while that was fun, it was a whole lot more fun without the big baby belly and with the drinking of alcohol. I love recruiting - love talking about being a lawyer, love talking about my firm (which, even if I have occasional bouts of job dissatisfaction really is a fabulous place to work), love talking to law students, love excuses to be back in Chicago on the corporate expense account doing all of the above... I only wish I could stay longer. But I made the trip count- I flew in early so I could meet two of my best friends from law school for lunch, one of whom lives in Chicago and one of whom lives in NYC but was here with her own firm for the event. I wish I could force all my law school friends to move down south- law school gave me the closest group of girl friends I've had since middle school and I miss them so much when we're scattered around the U.S. (and we really are scattered: Chicago, NYC, DC, Boston, LA, Austin). But at least I'm comforted with our regular visits and the fact that time disappears any time we're together. After lunch I spent over an hour walking around my city. I miss walking and I really miss living in a city with a bustling downtown.

I headed to the southside at 4, and at some point during the cab ride I realized that I've now been out of law school for just about as long as I was in it. That struck me for some reason. I'm really a lawyer now, and I like it. I've never looked at the law students and wished to be back in their shoes. I miss my friends, I miss the life of a student, and I now have an appreciation and almost awe for just how much the University of Chicago taught me how to think about the law, but I'm quite happy on this side of the JD. The event went very well. I was by myself because the UChicago hiring partner couldn't make it, but that was just as well because I got to be much less formal and just have fun chatting with all the students who came by my table. After the event I took two of our future summer associates out for dinner. It was a Tuesday night, so I assumed most restaurants would have plenty of tables, but no, apparently lots of people eat out at fancy places at 8 pm on Tuesday. Given my usual Tuesday night routine of working on the couch while watching Glee and maybe enjoying a small glass of wine, this kind of blew my mind. A mid-week social life, what?

Dinner was lots of fun. I like our two summers a lot, though neither of them will be in the Austin office. We finished up at 11:30 (11:30! pm! it was madness) after a dessert of warm brownies with homemade chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream (We ate at Gilt Bar- if you live in Chicago, go there and order the roast chicken, it's insanely good. I've never had my mouth water over a chicken entree, I'm a steak girl all the way, but this was pretty much the best chicken I've ever had in my life). I've been sleeping terribly the past few days- getting 4 and 5 hours of cobbled together tossing and turning, so I took two strong sleeping pills, crawled in bed, and prayed for some rest. And I got it- at least until the sun came up.

So it's been a good trip. I loved being back in the law school- without the stress of being a student, it's really a lovely place. Several classmates were there with their firm, so it's a mini reunion of sorts, and I got to see a few old professors. The only downside is losing an entire day and a half of billable hours, but it was worth it. And now I'm heading home in an hour to my little Clairebiscuit, who I really missed, and my Lanman, who no one could believe is about to turn 4. I can't either. In my mind, the time since I've graduated always feels like about a year, it's really hard to believe it's been three.

Degree Appreciation

Sometimes, after being productive for what feels like too long without pause, I like to click around on random websites to find a distracting tidbit. It's like a battery charge for my brain. I just need a little boost, and that boost comes from turning it off and reading something mindless. This is why, at my busiest, I am unusually up on celebrity gossip.

Today, after billing a solid 4 hour block to something involving painstaking details and lots of squinting, I clicked over to Above the Law (an online gossip blog about law, law school, and BigLaw firms). I don't check ATL nearly as much I used to. It was fun in law school when it seemed like every day was an update on which firms were raising their associates' salaries, but when it switched to depressing updates on how many associates were being laid off from those same firms, I stopped reading (unless, of course, someone sends me an article about my firm, then I click right over).

Today I found an article called, "Best Law Schools for Getting a BigLaw Job" and guess who was #1?

I don't know why that made me happy, since I'm on the other side of that issue, but it did. As long as I'm paying $2,000/month in loans, I suppose the least my school can do is get jobs for those who will soon be doing the same. Plus, I'm on the local alumni admissions committee, so now I have a stat to tell the admitted undecided students. I was also glad to see that the class number has remained under 200. The small class size at Chicago matters a lot. I believe that even more so now that I've graduated and have talked to my colleagues who went to other, larger law schools (mostly UT and Harvard, which are both huge). I think it's hard not to let numbers creep up, after all, it's extra money and Chicago doesn't have a large endowment, but I'm proud they're sticking to it. That article links to another article about Chicago's grading system describing students' battle with the administration about our low (and possibly lowered) curve. I'm kind of proud of that too (the low curve, not the complaining, though I think it's good to have a voice; another good thing about the small class size is the administration is usually responsive, even if their response is no); it's a tough school. Some days when I feel overwhelmed by whatever task is in front of me, I'll catch a glimpse of the picture of Chicago's chapel that is framed along with my diploma. The chapel is where we graduate- where I got my hood and carried Landon down the aisle, and I think, if I survived 3 years there, then I can probably handle this.

Something I should keep in mind right now, actually. I'm drafting a response to a motion in limine that involves a terribly complicated area of IP law and I keep putting off my westlaw searches (and my reading, oh the reading that needs to be done) in favor of things like checking Above the Law and writing about it. (Also accomplished so far: catching up on the Go Fug Yourself and TLo fashion posts and planning my outfit for tomorrow: a navy blue and white striped jersey dress with pale yellow peep toe wedges and pearl earrings. It makes me feel cheerful to think about it and I'm afraid I'm going to need the cheer.)

Okay, back to work, I need to be in bed by midnight. An update on other things, like the Biscuit, her superhero-obsessed brother, and JP's job search coming soon.

Oh, but P.S. This WSJ article about playing Monopoly at UChicago in the 1970's made me smile. A constitutional convention for the game? Protest signs? It is truly a haven for nerds and it makes me happy they have a place to run free.